22nd-24th of August and IAST257

There are round boxes! Hats often comes in round boxes. Chocolate might also. Sometimes the lid is translucent too! Often they also appear with beautiful ribbons. So the last three days I made the boxes round. The patterns which appears are: Printemps (Zt) Arcflower (JJ La Barbera), Zenribbon with fragment K3 and a fragment of my own, Lollywimple (Sandy Hunter) and Well well well (Zt). I wanted the surrounding to be black but I also knew that too much black on the calendarpage would bleed through so I just gave it one layer. First I didn´t like the striped effect but then I heard from some friends this added something to the page and now I kind of like it as it came out. I also go a very good tip from Sue Zanker how to prevent the bleeding and get it all really black: Go back on the blackened surface with a soft blac colorpencil and work it in! I will sure try that next time I do something like this!

IAST 257 is all about a recent published pattern, Twilight,  by Jody Genovese. Here is my first take on it (not my last I belive):

Twilight reminds me of a couple of other patterns, Footlight and Munchin f.ex. Only straight lines this time. Straight lines are interesting in another way than curved lines and sometimes I love to celebrate the straight ones! Not using rulers or anything else then my free hand ofcourse. It is a lot of zen in drawing a line slowly, breath and stay focused. The lines are not perfect and shouldn´t be. I like it this way! 

There are spectacular skies in the evenings here now! Last nights dogwalk gave me this:

A little bit like Twilight.....

19th-21st of March, Zen-Buttons and Diva´s challenge.

Revisiting patterns made me get back quite long ago. I found Niuroda (Tina Akua Hunziker). This is a wonderful tangle that thrilled me at the first sight and it still does! Niuroda took place on the entire page!

Things are happening very fast in Zen-world. Patterns pop up all the time, new ones and old ones you haven´t met before. Different and new techniques are also coming along. Right now  Zen-buttons are all over the place. Marguerite Samama is the one behind it. She made it up inspired by a Reticula found in Zentangle Primer 1. I have tried this easy and fun technique too. Here are som of my Buttons, all done on tiny little Bijou:

Mine are no perfect circles, I draw them on free hand and I like the imperfection. Well I guess the Zen-Buttons are the reason I found Niuroda again and hope she will stay with me a little longer this time!

I am the Diva´s challenge 356 is a little bit different this week. Laura asked us to use our names as string. This time I didn´t watch the Diva´s video before doing it... I used cardboard from a box I cut in pieces. Recycling! I love to do that! Here is my piece for the challenge:

I guess my name is hard to find here, but I DID use it as a string, I promise! I had some fun and there are a lot of patterns; Wholly Hollibaugh, Striping, Printemps, Diva Dance, Flux, Tipple, Cubine and lovely Verve (JJ Le Barbera).  

The Diva´s challenge no. 347

This time Laura Harms asked us to just grab something and use it for a string (tracing it). So I found a roll of scotch in a holder fitting on my tile. Here it is:

I had some fun using Lori Byerly´s patterns: Gr8, Paki and Mashed. Then I had to try some tranzending on it too. I loved to do this challenge, since I feel a little stuck doing my strings in the same style all the time! Thank´s Laura, this was perfect match with me right now!

Apprentice tile

12 Days of Zentangle goes on and a lot of inspiration follows! I think I have not mentioned Apprentice tile?! It is a little bit larger: 11,4 x 11,4 cm. The common tile is 8,9 x 8,9cm. On Day Four Rick use the Aprentice tile and since I cut my white tiles myself from a sheet of Fabriano Tiepolo paper (same as in regular tiles), I easily cut me a couple of Apprentice tiles, just to experience the difference. Original Apprentice tiles are cut from a Bristol-paper though.

I used Pigma Micron 0,3 to get closer to the same pen Rick used in the video. It was fun to do this and I had no trouble at all using a larger space. Doing the Diva Dance with Sproings as it was demonstrated was fun and very relaxing. I had to tell myself to STOP, it just went on and on and on! 

I also realized that Apprentice tiles are prefect for not only young beginners but also for adults and not only for beginners! It offers a larger space (sometimes that is very refreshing), which might be easier to handle if your eyes don´t function as they should do or if you have trouble with fine motor abilities! The effect of the 0,3 pen on this size is comparable to the 0,1 on 8,9 x 8,9 cm !  

10th-15th of December and 12 Day´s for Christmas.

One of those things, I don´t have much time for in December is posting in this blog, or being present in social media. That´s the way it is. I try to make my christmas-cards, and allow myself to prepare things I like to do for christmas. But my calendar is on the priority-list as well as be sure I have a moment for meditation every day. 

10-11th, I went for Flux. Flux is a flowing tangle and can go on forever! This was inspired by Molly Hollibaugh´s day two in the 12 Day´s of Christmas.

13th of December is important here in Sweden. We celebrate Lucia from Siracuse. This time of year we need some enlightning in the darkness, the sun doesn´t shine too long during the daytime so Lucia coming whit candles in her hair is popular in more than one way. I felt for star-shaped tangles and started with Afterglo (Carole Ohl, Auraknot (Zt) and X (Lila Popcheff). The stars are accompanied by Striping, Pokeroot, Pokeleaf and Echoism, all (Zt). A little glimpse of blue...

12 Days of Christmas from Zentangle consists of one video a day, starting on 12th of December and is very inspiring. I intend to try them all but in my own pace and own order. Don´t know if I succeed..

Here is my tile for Day One, using Crescent moon, Hollibaugh, Printemps, Bales and Sprinkle. Sometimes it is so good visiting some basics as the Z-string and early learned tangles just trying to do something new with them!

Then I jumped to Day three:

Maria demonstrated her new tangle Rumpus. I followed her instructions to experience this tangle from the start. It was a meditative moment today, doing it like this on a white Zendala and Rumpus will stay in my library of tangles for sure! I love the repetitive strokes, and the possibilities I can imagine for this tangle!

4th-9th of December

I do like my plan to make friends with patterns in December!

4th-6th I spent time whit Phicops (Laura Harms and Brad Harms) and Swarm (Zt). A little Fescu also grow n the 6th. I did improve specially with Phicops, a beautiful tangle.

The last three days I spent with Pea-nuckle (Molly Hollibaugh). I like Pea-nuckle a lot, but I need to work on it to find the flow! Some Swarm and Phicops still wants to participate!

My Opus 1.

I started my first Opus ever August 20th inspired by the Mosaic-challenge Joey initiated. Today I have finished it. I haven´t worked on it every day, but I have seen it every day except when I was away to Östhammar last week. Don´t know if it was a good idea, but I left the shading and the coloring to the end and that took me a lot of time. I wasn´t sure where this would go at all. But here is my finished result.

I have listed the patterns and the date I first used them on the back of the tile. As I count them there are 17 patterns!!! Is this really me??? I blackened a part I found disturbing in the end. That was satisfying, but I am happy I left the decision till the last day I laid my hand on this!
I took a pic before or almost before shading. Unfortunately it is unsharp. I was so eager to go on with the shading I didn´t take more than one shot.

And here is the start:

As you can see I started with African Artist (Tina Aqua Hunziker), which was the start of Joey´s Mosaic-challenge. I have turned my Opus-tile several times during the process but as I started the shading it just wanted to be the way I took the final pic of it!

It was an experience to do this. I thought I never would. I might do it again, but not too soon. As I have finished it today I don´t even know what I think about the result. But I know I have enjoyed the process very much and that is what counts to me here and now. 

IAST 207

Cross-ur-heart (Jenna Black) is a pretty new tangle. This is the focus on IAST 207 and it should be done as a monotangle.

It was a challenge to use this tangle in the suggested string. No matter if Adele pointed out that we should think freely about the string in this case. Cross-ur-heart is a fluently going pattern, it is easy to learn and easy to draw.  But I wanted it in the center of the tile!!! Anyhow, this is the way it went and I am glad I did it and satisfied with the way it came out in the end.

Zendala-Time!

Today I wanted to go on with round ones. So I choose a white zendala-tile. It is different from drawing in a round on an ordinary tile. It is larger. And for me it takes a little bit more time to do than a tile 8,9x8,9 cm. The zendala is 11,7 cm diameter. But as I start I love to do them. Here is my today:

The patterns that came by: Pach (Judy Okawa), Balloya (Anya Lothrop) Orbs de la Dee (Anneke van Dam), Beadline (Margaret Bremner) and Locar (Zt). Pach is a pattern I learned not long ago. But looking at the steps was not enough! As Adele Bruno posted her tips for drawing it, I suddenly could draw it easily and fluently! Thank´s Adele!

Today I made a string very simply using another tile to draw the "wings" and then a can-lid to get an inner circle. Sometimes it is good to have a geometric structure and I thought I needed one for this occasion.

A funny thing, today I had to go and consult my dentist to solve a problem (it has to do with age I am afraid) and as I look at this zendala I can´t help looking at white teeth! I didn´t plan the patterns and where they should be, they knew it themselves! And I end up with a smile! 

My calendar meets Sandy Hunter

There are so many talented tanglers around this planet. Some of them I have found. Most of them I haven´t. One of those tangler Ifound early on my tangling journey was Sandy Hunter. I have enjoyed her tangles a lot, Akoya, Lollyvimple, Merryweather and ofcourse Crouffle which is very easy to get addicted to. Last three days I decided to find out more about tangles from Sandy Hunter I didn´t know  and had not tried before. Here are the three patterns I choose:

25th: Snorr. I thought thisone would be a little bit difficult to learn, but following the stepout I found it was very easy and very fun to draw.
26th: Papermint.I have seen this pattern being used once and wanted to try it. So unexpectedly fun! Very easy to learn!
27th: Pooma. This pattern I choose because I had not seen it before and in the stepout Sandy showed many variations of it and this is one variation. To me circles are fun to draw but they are also tricky. Very seldom I have managed to draw a circular circle. Not this time either, but it doesn´t matter it looks cool anyway!

Coffecups and lack of milk

This morning wasn´t what it used to be. No milk for my coffee!That means no coffe to me. The Grocers is not next door where I live, so instead of taking my cup filled with coffee and milk I choose to tangle the focus-pattern from Square One, which is: Coffecups by Simone Hassel!

I didn´t intend to make it a monotangle but as I used string 83  (Anne Marks) it just became one! This pattern was more fun than I thought of! And I think my tile is fun too! But now I have to get me some milk an get me some coffee for real!

And finally, better late than never, I got me a delicious cup of coffee!

Calendar 19th-24th of June

After my latest post we have been celebrating Solstice or as we call it in Sweden: Midsummers Eve and Midsummers Day. This must be the most Swedish tradition there is! Jumping and dancing round a poole decorated with leafs, flowers and wreaths! Eating, drinking and singing Swedish drinking songs.

I am not sure this affected my calendarpages. They are all filled with O-tangles for "Today´s Tangles".

Maybe they are a little busy. But I liked to do them. There is only one tangle I haven´t tried before and that is Owls by Beth Snoderly on 22nd. But some of the patterns I don´t use regularely.

The patterns are: Onamato (Zt), (O)by Damy, Orbs de la Dee (Anneke van Dam), Olb (Helen Williams), O (Adele Bruno), Off Key (Lori Byerly), Orange Arc (Sandra Strait) Oybay (Antonine Koval), Opus (Zt), Owls (Beth Snoderly), Organic (Sayantika Ray), Ovy (Adam Roades), Oke (Michele Beauchamp), On Target (Barbara Finwall) and Oof (Zt).

My calendar goes Steampunkish!

The focustangle of Square One is now Struutz by Sarah Fowler. It wasn´t new to me, I had saved the stepout in my pile with tangles to try! Struutz is different to most of the patterns going around among tanglers. It looks fun and it is so fun to draw!

Struutz forced me to explore more about Steampunk-style. Once when I was a begginer in the zentangleworld I got a comment saying something like my tile looked like steampunk. I had never heard that word before and knew nothing about it, so I looked it up. From what I understood it was about machines, Bolts, Materials and so on. Here you can find out more about Steampunk!

Of course you can draw Struutz in many other contexts, but my first thought about the pattern was something belonging to a machine! So the last three days was like this, crowded, filled up and a lot of new things. 

16th of June: Struutz (Sarah Fowler), Dansk (Margaret Bremner), Showgirl (Vicki Bassett), and Hearts4G (mine).

17th of June: More Struutz with Gear Flower (Sandra Strait), Nuts and Bolts (Ina Sonnenmoser), Vitruvius (Zt) and Maze (Zt).

18th of June: Even more Struutz with Gear Flower (Sandra Strait), Geared (Sandra Strait), Holes (Suzanne McNeill), Dansk (Margaret Bremner), Hearts4G (mine), Mooka (Zt), Dex (Zt), and Maze (Zt).

Today 19th of June I was ready to try it on a tile! 

It looks cleaner, I slow down more working on a regular tile. Here with Vitruvius, Cubine, Hibred and Tipple. I might not be a Steampunk tangler, but I can see the style has affected at least this tile.

What I learned from this adventure is, Steampunk is FUN, Steampunk looks very complicated but isn´t, Steampunk is relaxing so if you haven´t tried it, don´t hesitate! Give it a round!

I am the Diva´s challenge no 319 and IAST 198

I made my beads of courage, for Diva´s challenge 319, last night before going to sleep. Here it comes:

I used Agni (Lily Moon), Cruffle (Sandy Hunter) and some other Beads I have no name on. This is a different and relaxing challenge from the Diva coming back now and then. This time I went for color again and for shading I used a Distress Marker.

The next challenge I really wanted to participate in is IAST 198. It is a feature for Agni, the pattern that Lily Moon created her daughter in memoriam. I love that pattern and doing it I send my thoughts to Lily for her unbelivable loss.

In the challenge there are also Knightsbridge (Zt) and Tira (Ragged Ray).  Knightsbridge is a dominant pattern, I like it but very often it takes over the place! I have only tried Tira once and I wasn´t to happy of the result that time! But here I like it. It is like the pearls in Agni continue in Tira!

7th, 8th and 9th of May

The patterns in the calendar the last three Days:

7th of May: Balo (Hsin Yah Hsu), Lenche (mine), Tropicana (Kate Ahrens), Cheesecloth (Suzanne McNeill) and Layered Crescentmoon and a kind of ribbon that I don´t know if it exists as a pattern. But now it does anyhow!

8th of May: Lenche (mine), Papz (mine), Balo (Hsin-Yah Hsu), Faux Weave (Helen Williams) and the ribbon I don´t know about.

9th of May: Papz (mine), Garlic cloves (Jacquelien Bredenoord), Balo (Hsin-Yah Hsu) and that something else.ribbon.

The last two days has been occupied of what was going on with my dad. Surgery today. He is on his way back we hope. Tangling in this mood has been a great thing to do. My evening meditation I also did with my dad in mind. 

The patterns are: Papz, Striping, Tripoli, Arukas, Fescu and Black Pearlz.

3Z - for Dad

Today my dad is going to the hospital. Tomorrow he is going through a big surgery. He is 88 years old. I am not there physically but with my mind. Of course I am worried. But right now there is nothing I can do. He is in my tangling. My thoughts go to him. My prayers as well.

As I look at the result of today´s tangling on 3Z I get a picture of the subconcious process going on. And it deals with my dads situation.  I can see that. But I also can see there is balance and strength. I appreciate that and I am thankful. The patterns are Crescent moon and of course Papz, the pattern I made up for my Dad. I filled it with pearls but now when I look at it they look like lamps....

I thought of giving this tile some color. Maybe it will come up... or not. Today it looks like this anyhow.

What about the string and Balo?

This is my first tile with Balo (Hsin-Ya Hsu).I wanted to learn about how this tangle works. I mainly to use a string when I tangle. It is like the string takes the responsibility, not me, where everything is going.

Actually there is no string in this one. Or more precisely: I made the dots in the corners and the pencil-line connecting the dots, then the penciled line also became the string!

The pattern Balo is a Ribbon, and a ribbon that takes it´s place and will be dominating any tile. It is very pretty and kind of lace-like. I found it easy to learn and relaxing to draw. In the middle comes Assunta again. I think I start to love drawing Assunta after having tried it a lot lately. 

On tanglepattern.com there is a tangle-randomizer. It works very good also with strings. there are 250 strings published on the site. I have tried them all, but now I re-try them now and then with the help of the randomizer. Today I got string 65 (Pat Ferguson). Maybe it is hard to follow, but it is there!

I found this string perfect for Starfish flower (Nicole Dreyer). It is my first Starfish flower but I belive it won´t be the last. It is a pattern built on Echoing lines and very fun to do! The others are Fun Bee (Beate Winkler), Crescentmoon (Zt), Meer (Zt), and Tipple (Zt). 

4th, 5th and 6th of May

4th of May: I started exploring Assunta (Zt), a tangle I  am not familiar with. I have seen it some times but it hasn´t attracted me. The negative form in Assunta looks like Cadent as Linda Farmer noted on the description of the tangle. It is a little bit tricky, the pointing "leaves" or "petals" goes in several directions. As I played with it I tried to transform it into cadent but Huggins was in the way so it went totally crazy! 

5th of May: I wanted to try Carole Ohl´s fragment-play with Pokeleaf. I did, but I draw the grid with my Micron, not with pencil and I think it came out pretty cool! 

6th of May: I used the idea of Dingbatz, to make frames and put the tangles inside. One Scallamp had to join, though it broke the frame att took Pokeleaf with her! Assunta and Huggins stayed calm.

One more for the Divas Amandaday-challenge

I love recycling. I use it very much in my art. So I wanted to make one more for Earth Day and for the Diva´s challenge this week. When I have done something that I don´t like at the moment, I don´t throw it away.  I keep it for further use. I have some watercolors kept in a pile and now I cut up one (on heavyweight watercolor-paper)  in tile-size and tangled on it! As it was a quite big watercolor-painting, I have a lot of tiles from this! Here is the first one:

The surface is not as smooth as on original tiles but it worked and I get a good feeling to remake an old watercolor-painting in this way!

The patterns are: 5C Aura (Ina Sonnenmoser), Andromeda (Lily Moon), Lealad (Lily Moon) and something that is the beginning of Amphora (Lily Moon).  

28th, 29th and 30th of April for Lily Moon

In Square One the focus is on the patterns of Lily Moon.Lily Moon is such a great tangler and one of the administrators of Square One. Her patterns are beautiful and I have used most of them in my tangeling journey. There is a dark reason for this focus - Lily is in a situation noone wants to be in right now and Chris Titus took this initiative since tangeling also is a way to bring strength and energy. In this way Chris invited tanglers all over the world to send their thoughts or/and prayers to Lily. It is a wonderful idea.

My last three days I have focused on this task. A freehand penciled heart as a string. Under the tangled hearts there are wishes penciled from me for Lily. I wish her strength, peace, comfort and balance. 

28th of April: Andromeda and Andante by Lily Moon + Balloya (Anya Lothrop) and Fescu.

29th of April: Andromeda an Amphora by Lily Moon

30th of April: Drogon and Lealad by Lily Moon.